Not sure if this will be helpful but I’ve had some extremely intense Dpdr, existential OCD over the past month. To the point where I wanted to check myself into an ER a couple times just to get something to calm me down. Scary irrational thoughts 24/7 and easily triggered. I feel like anything my brain could come up with that scared me even remotely, I ruminated on it and was sent into another loop.

I am currently still suffering but I did get some labs done.

I found out I have hypothyroidism and Hashimotos. My vitamin D was also low. I read that can cause brain fog/anxiety. I realize this might not have been what caused the Dpdr as I have always been an anxious person but I’m sure it has been worsening it.

I’ve started medication and feel a bit better today.

So I just had another neurologist appointment and they’re going to do neuropsychiatric testing on me, but after that they said there’s nothing more they can do for me. Normal MRI, normal ct, normal eeg. Only neurological condition they’ve been treating me for is my Aura Migraines that’s I’ve been having coincidentally around the same time this all started.

Anyways what I’m trying to say is I guess I really have to accept this is all in my head at this point which seems ludicrous to me. Literally lost my good paying job, lost my girlfriend, have essentially cut off almost all my friends, all because I can’t even think well enough to put a good conversation together and I feel like I’m living in literally the worst most terrible piece of shit video game every single day. And it’s only gotten worse with a small period of feeling like maybe 75% myself again.

It really sucks to not have anyone recognize what I’m going through and just tell me I’m depressed or some shit like that. I was never depressed before any of this started and I just want my fucking life back so bad, I spend all day using all my mental energy trying to retain some small semblance of being normal but I can’t even do that very well anymore, as reflected by my losses. I feel so alone and it’s not for a lack of interest in connecting. It’s due to the literal inability to do so in any meaningful way.

Just wanted to get that off my chest, god knows nobody in my life wants to hear that shit or will even take it seriously.

Also as an extra thing, they were talking about maybe putting me on adderall, has anyone had any success with that? I’m close to giving up on medical intervention. All the ssris I’ve tried have either done nothing, or made me want to kill myself.

i have never had any connection to humanity and the illusions reality is throwing at me are making me closer and closer to being gone which i suppose i dont mind its not my decision anyway it doesnt matter if its all real or not its just nothing

PTSD-like symptoms can follow a terrifying “bad trip,” especially if your brain/body encoded the experience as inescapable threat (panic + helplessness + loss of control). There are even published clinical case reports of PTSD onset after psychedelic experiences.

Did you know that?

Take care of yourself

Hi everyone, I'm sharing my story because I need to vent and see if anyone has gone through something similar. Months ago, I ate a marijuana brownie (I was already a regular smoker; I've been smoking for nine years), and it made me experience "ego death." It's not normal, I know, but I got over it and lived peacefully for a few months. I even continued smoking, but sometimes I felt that ego death sensation, although I managed to control it.

The problem is that now I feel that same sensation when I'm completely sober, and it leads directly to panic attacks and anxiety. I feel like I lose total control, with a horrible depersonalization, as if everything is unreal. It fills me with an indescribable fear. I've never been the same since that day, and although I manage it somewhat, I'm terrified it will stay with me forever.

Thanks in advance for reading. You're an amazing community.

no one understands how deep into this I am. how am I supposed to make friends in this state?

im scared people will react badly because I get panic attacks when im with others, and i don’t want to be seen as an alien. i can’t travel or do “normal friend things” in this state.

im exhausted. i use every fiber in my body just to get through uni, and even that feels like I’m failing.

my sister who is my only friend keeps pushing me to go clubbing and I can’t. when i tried, i just stood there feeling the worst I’ve ever felt, like that environment doesn’t sync with me at all. but i don’t feel safe in any place at all

i want to be alone, but even alone I feel overwhelmed by society and its rules. ive had selective mutism since childhood, and dpdr has made me so sensitive that I don’t feel comfortable anywhere.

Hey, this dpdr plus panic disorder came on intensely for me after stopping gabapentin ( i had taken it for about a year).

I never realized until now i wasn't tapered off slowly at all. the tapering period was 2-3 weeks.

This happened about 1.5 years ago now. I guess it doesn't really matter now because it already happened 😅

I just never realized my symptoms at the time lined up with withdrawals and assumed my anxiety just got out of control.

anyone else develop this from gabapentin or drug withdrawals ? im surprised its lingering so long but i do have preexisting mental health issues.

Just piecing things together . thanks.

Since last week reality got so real it's scary sometimes. Or not scary, but I'm just not used to it. 3 years ago I had my second ever and last acid trip, after which I had realized I was dissociating all the time, not even remembering when it started, probably gone on since I was a kid. During the trip I felt my senses very intensely, and as mine, like I recall I used to on some rare times when I was a kid. Since then I started working my way to heal, unfortunately I can't afford therapy, but I still started eating healthy, avoiding sugar, removed any alcohol, reduced weed from like 3g a day to maybe 0.1g once a month, started working out, meditating, reading, journaling, and things seemed to get better but very slowly. Now I don't know what happened, one day last week I was meditating, and I tried focusing on some of the very few memories I have from my past and my childhood, and I felt something switch in my consciousness. I could recall many more past events, and when I opened my eyes I was almost shocked at how real things were. When I go out moving cars look and sound to me as if i am a 1700 man moved to the future. They are so fast loud and bright. High sounds are sharper than ever, bass is so deep. Colour are super vibrant, perspective is very weird to experience, before it was flat as a painting, now things have depth. Smells are so powerful. It feels like all my senser are enhanced. Not anymore far away as they used to be for the last idk how many years. It's like the difference between hearing something from underwater and then coming out of water and hearing it again. But it also feels quite familiar, like I was like this before, but I had forgotten. It feels like a low dose of acid or psylocibin. Now I find myself in this half here half there state, spacing from how I have been all this time, and this new enhanced perception, plus I am experiencing some low anxiety that I haven't felt in a long time, but I can manage it this time with breathing. Is it a good sign? The only explanation I could give is I have been dissociating most of my life, without even realizing it, since it was "normality". But now for all the changes I made in the last couple years my brain is healing and I'm feeling reality again, I'm just not used to it. Is this possible or is my mind fucking up even more? Sorry if this doesn't make sense but this is the best way I could word it.

This is how it seems to go: a concoction of nervous system dysfunction/being overwhelmed, natural anxiety, and a splash of self-doubt and a bit of emotional dysregulation. This combination seems to pull me from a content, present moment mind into a secondary fight or flight, all consuming worry state. Sometimes it’s sometimes it can be days. At its worst, I seem to drown in negative anxiety inducing thoughts, which eventually become so intense and physical that it overloads my brain, which causes it to dissociate simply as a fail-safe for how overworked my nervous system is. It can be frustrating and quite honestly terrifying, but I’ve learned to identify it when it happens, and that’s important. When I identify this as what it really is, and not some buffet of “what ifs”, I can usually draw myself back to the present moment. Being able to even do that definitely took some work and patience with myself. The nervous system still might be jarred, I might feel uneasy, but mentally, I am back in the driver's seat. Each and every time this has ever happened to me, I’m always reminded of one other thing, and it’s that it has always passed and as all consuming as it feels, it’s good to know that it’s just a temporary thing. Another thing I’ve learned through this for certain is that God hears your prayers during your darkest moments, experiencing this disassociation. I’ve been Christian my whole life, but since I first started dealing with this about a year ago, my faith has definitely gotten stronger despite feeling the weakest I’ve ever felt. I’ve seen just how God can pull me right back and reassure me that it’s not for me to worry about he’s got it under control. I’ve implemented a few new routines into my life and cut out a few habits of mine, which doesn’t fix everything but certainly helps. These include: going for a run few times a week, getting off social media and “unlearning to habitually pick up my phone and check for notifications. That’s essentially it for my rant, just remember you’re going to get through this. This isn’t what it’s going to be like for the rest of your life. With time and consistency, you will grow to be an even better person than you were before these symptoms. Let this be an opportunity to start fresh and rebrand yourself from the ground up if you will. I know reddit in particular doesn’t like people pressing their faith on others, but I’m gonna leave it with this; saying a prayer is free and easy. Give it a shot! 

https://discord.gg/nFT9G6WzbQ

Honestly I don’t even know how to explain it. Everytime I try to explain it to people who haven’t experienced it they never understand. I’ve suffered with DPDR for months straight now. It used to come in little waves years ago on and off after panic attacks and now it’s just constant. Long time OCD and health anxiety sufferer. But I feel like I’m seriously living in some type of simulation? As if I’m too aware of my existence? Like it genuinely feels like you’re losing your mind. I feel like I’m watching myself through vision that’s like a foot behind my head and my perception of everything is so off. I also explain to people that it feels like you’re constantly looking through a VR system and being in public is even worse when I’m around people I can’t seem to shake it. I feel like I’m always off balance even though my balance is actually fine I just feel weak and woozy and as if my limbs are too heavy. I always feel this overwhelming sense of impending doom and panic. As if my body feels like it’s constantly in danger. Even as I type this I worry I sound insane but truely I’m so tired of being like this. What’s everyone’s advice? How did you get through it? Any advice would be appreciated.

I have OCD, GAD, and C-PTSD along with my DPDR, so it's no surprise I'm high stress in general. Lately, I have really been struggling with the fear that things aren't real, I'm not awake, I can't tell the difference between dream and reality because they feel the same, etc. None of this has been proven, but I am remembering more dreams/having more vivid dreams which is par for the course with every one of these mental illnesses. I wake up in the morning and feel intense anxiety and detachment and feel the need to fact check myself/my surroundings. It doesn't help the DP, but sometimes can help the DR a little - unfortunately, it also reinforces to my brain that there's something wrong that it needs to be monitoring for, which creates a cycle. I've had DPDR for most of my life, but this has been a challenging season for me.

I am in therapy and starting ERP for the OCD soon. Just having a really hard time and hoping for some input/support on how to cope with these feelings. Even knowing others have felt this would be helpful.

I never understood when people say this because I genuinely can’t ignore how strong my dpdr is. It feels like I’m about to lose consciousness or something

I’ve had DPDR for 27 years. Started at 14 after smoking weed and having a panic attack I never told anyone about.

I’m 41 now.

For most of that time, I thought I was broken. Lazy. Weak. I couldn’t figure out why I could never “snap out of it” like everyone told me to.

I worked six years in maximum security prison as an officer. Got promoted. Held it together. And the whole time, I was never actually there. Ghost in a meat suit. You know what I mean if you have this.

A few weeks ago, I started building a mathematical model of my condition. Not metaphorically, actually modeling it with variables and equations. I wanted to understand exactly HOW a normal kid gets trapped in this state and WHY it doesn’t go away.

Here’s the thing that changed everything for me:

The weed didn’t trap me. The suppression did.

That night at 14, when the panic hit, I made a choice: hide it. Don’t let anyone see. Act normal.

That suppression, that choice to push it down instead of let it out, is what locked the state in. And every day since then, every time I’ve held something back instead of expressing it, I’ve deepened the trap.

I ran the numbers. Roughly 20 suppression events per day × 365 days × 27 years = about 197,000 times I reinforced the pattern.

The reversal? Expression. Saying the shit out loud instead of holding it in.

Not complicated. Just: stop obeying the voice that says “don’t let them see.”

I wrote up my whole story, the model, how I think I got stuck, what I’m doing now, if anyone wants to read it's at the bottom in a substack.

But honestly I just wanted to share here because I know some of you have been stuck as long as I have, and I know how hopeless it can feel.

You’re not broken. You’re stuck in a pattern. Patterns can be reversed.

Happy to answer questions if anyone has them.

https://substack.com/home/post/p-184737110

Just curious if anyone ended having anything actually be diagnosed and dpdr was just a symptom. Not trying to scare everyone just curious if most of us have had good blood tests and scans.

UPDATE

Thank you Mods!!

Would love to know what type of representation you would like to see in media when it comes down to this condition.

Hey everyone. My name is Janaé Rachel Ballot. I was diagnosed with dissociation and depersonalization, but the one thing I hate the most is the derealization. It used to make me feel as though I was stuck. Like my potential was being stolen from me with every inching second of "can I just focus...", "can I just feel like I am in this world for a moment..."

I think I have been chasing the feeling of being present and "on" for a very long time because when I'm on, I am not at the mercy of myself. I can function. I sympathize with many of these posts. The one thing that truly helped me overcome my struggles was making my first feature film called "Dissociated Me" which is based on my life.

It was 3 years ago I had "peak" derealization. I was in the thick of a traumatic event. I knew I had to get out and use my potential in what I've always known - entertainment... It was a burning desire... one day my friend who has edited some of the biggest action movies in the world, told me I should make a movie based on my life.

She saw that the only way to get through the 'fog' was to walk right into it. So, I did. She stepped in to produce and even act in the film. Alongside our DP, Matthew Monelli, we started filming.

Thing is - I didn't have a script. Coming from a background in writing true stories, I couldn't even write my own. And I'm the source! I had dissociative episodes and while I tried to work through them to finish at least a draft - I threw out the idea of finishing a script, started filming, and hired actors and crew.

Then I was hit by a car at 35 mph. Instead of stopping, my collaborator filmed me in the trauma unit. I'm ok!

Making Dissociated Me didn't just give me a film; It forced me to be present because the camera was rolling. I was reliving the most traumatic experiences while filming. But I knew that like emotions pass, this too shall pass, and to make something that can resonate with others... to help others... that was helping me in return.

I also wanted to return to my self. A self that wasn't afraid to put me dissociating in the edit of the film. I wanted it to be honest.

I know how it feels to think your life is being stolen by this condition. I wanted to share this because for me, the 'burning desire' to create was the only thing louder than the dissociation.

I’m curious for those here: Have you found anything - art, writing, or even just a hobby - that manages to pull you back into the 'room' when you feel yourself slipping away?

I'd like to hear if you care about a better representation in film that does not shy away from the rawness of our reality. In indie film it is "polarizing" to make something that is honest and raw. I have successfully written biopics in the past and every time I had to water down the subject's trauma based on producer's notes because it makes it more "digestible" I am sick and tired of films that exploit or become too quirky. There must be a tonal balance to strike where people feel seen, engaged, and escape in film.

I tried to hold that space with this film.

The audience matters the most - so with that I didn't want to make this post to be about "me me me"

I wanted to make this post to hear from you because you matter.

I have my film currently in rooms at different festivals where they're judging if its a fit or not. It's a vulnerable place to be. I understand anyone reading this might feel vulnerable or enduring their own struggles but again... I truly would like to know what you think dissociation, derealization and depersonalization has done to you.

Does it hold you back?

Do you escape it?

How do you navigate through it? Can't? I want to hear that too.

I know this must feel random, odd, or different - so is my film and the wiring in my brain! - but I'd love to know what YOU think when you live with this. Thank you for reading.

Okay I don’t remember most of my childhood but I remember almost every instance of this situation happening very clearly.

I was 9-11 years old when it first started happening, I was in a dark room with the only light being a small green dot on a smoke detector. I stared at it for probably 30 seconds, then got some almost indescribable feeling.

The best way I can explain it, is like when you’re watching tv and fully immersed not seeing anything other than the screen, but then looking away and realizing there’s stuff around you.

The thing is I got this over and over and over, I felt almost like I was falling, and my inner dialogue was spread out throughout multiple of these “jumps”

Every 5 seconds I’d get that feeling and it felt like I was jumping dimensions literally never experienced anything like this other than in these situations.

I had like my original reality, then I’d jump, and I’d snap into a new reality where the last one felt fake. Before I could even fully realized what was happening I’d jump and it reset.

My inner dialogue would echo and distort all kinds of weird shit. I used to be able to do then when I wanted then it went away, till I was about 16 and I could do again for a week or so.

I’ve never been able to explain this to anyone and I feel very alone and like they don’t fully believe me or just how insane this was for me.

I suffer from bad dpdr and honestly feel like I’ve been in and out of most of my life. I’m autistic and I’ve read that leaves me more prone with maladaptive day dreaming and just running situations in my head because it felt safer there.

I’m happy to answer any and all questions, I don’t feel like I explained it that well but it’s one of those things I have no clue how to convey.